Japanese Foreign Policy toward Northeast Asia

Abstract

Observers of Japan’s foreign policy in the postwar period have generally agreed that it differs from the foreign policies of other comparable Western democracies. Few would disagree that in the second half of the twentieth century it has displayed at least three distinctive characteristics:

1.

The dominant influence of the U.S. relations.

2.

A passive, or reactive, posture, in which Japan attempts to achieve security and prosperity mainly through adapting itself to the existing international environment, based on the recognition that the international environment is basically a given framework that Japan is not capable of changing.

3.

A posture of minimalism, in which Japan, while focusing predominantly on economic rather than political or military goals, attempts to remain aloof from the aspect of power politics in international relations as much as possible, to keep its level of involvement in political and strategic issues of the world as low as possible, and to avoid confrontations with other countries as much as possible.